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DeMar DeRozan’s return helps Raptors sink Sixers

You half expected to walk into the Raptors’ locker room to find DeMar DeRozan resting comfortably in a rocking chair, a nice shawl around his shoulders, perhaps a lazy dog at his feet and hear him talk about the good old days.

Listening to him and coach Dwane Casey and it’s like DeRozan’s the oldest 26-year-old in the world.

“I’m trying to elevate my game by slowing it down,” DeRozan said after returning from a 21-game injury absence to lead the Raptors to a 100-84 win over the Philadelphia 76ers at the Air Canada Centre on Wednesday.

“That’s the way he is now,” Casey had said minutes earlier. “He’s playing like an old man, slow and methodical, slice and dice.”

It is true that DeRozan is not really the high-flying jaw-dropping athlete that he was as a teenager, but he is exponentially a better basketball player now than he’s ever been.

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He was once a gifted athlete who was figuring out how to be an NBAer; now he’s an NBAer who can doesn’t need to jump out of the gym to be effective.

And his first game back after a torn groin-hip tendon was a perfect demonstration of that.

DeRozan brought a level of calm to the game, a level of maturity, a thoughtful approach to a hectic game that was as much about his brains as his body.

He scored a team-high 20 points in 29 minutes, hitting nine of his 14 field goal attempts, dishing out three assists and grabbing four rebounds in his first game since Nov. 28.

“I think he’s been preparing the last couple of weeks extremely tough, and the hard work that he puts in, I thought he would play exactly how he played,” Kyle Lowry said of DeRozan. “Great.”

DeRozan helped take care of a solid start and a big finish as the Raptors won for just the second time in their last seven games.

He had six of his points in the opening quarter when Toronto jumped out to a 34-19 lead and then helped sealed the win in the fourth quarter.

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Coming back into the game with about 9 ½ minutes left, he proceeded to pour in eight points before leaving to another ovation with about two minutes to go.

“Just stayed level-headed, treat it like a normal game,” said DeRozan. “I didn’t want to get too high on it. I understood I still had to come out here and play. I didn’t want to go out there and try to do too much. Just played within the rhythm of the game.”

Against a gritty athletic Sixers team that never took a step back, the Raptors were not brilliant but they were more than good enough.

They overcame 16 turnovers and a season-best 29-points from Michael Carter-Williams of the Sixers by holding Philadelphia to less than 40 per cent shooting from the field.

Lou Williams had 19 points for Toronto, Kyle Lowry chipped in 18 to go along with 12 assists and Amir Johnson had 10 points and 16 boards.

And when they needed some quiet time amid the intensity of the game, DeRozan provided it.

“He brings a calm about it and not only that, he makes great decisions,” said Casey. “When things get helter-skelter, when we call a play, one of the plays we’ve been running for a while or whatever it is, there’s a calmness about him.

“The ball is secure, he makes great decisions, it allows Kyle to space out and spot up . . . Lou, whoever it is. He can quarterback as well as score.”

The Sixers may be one of the weakest offensive teams in the league — they are last in points per game, field goal percentage and three-point field goal percentage, so it is not a huge surprise they didn’t pile up the points. But the Raptors deserve some credit, too, as they held Philadelphia to just 39 per cent shooting from the field and 3-for-19 from three-point range.

DeRozan helped.

“It’s not like he’s a defensive stopper, but he’s always getting people in the right position, he’ cracking down, he’s in the help position — he does a little bit of everything,” said Casey.

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